Well, installation went very smooth and easy. took about a hour and half from off load to first fire. The top vent kit mated very smoothy to my simpson double wall, so installation was a snap. Most of the time was spent moving the old stove out, and hooking up the top vent kit on the xxv. Nothing really to report here, it was a basic installation with zero venting labor.
First fire up sent the smoke alarms going nuts. It fired right up, with very minimal smoke at start up. The unit got to temp, and it burned off really well.
I am completely blown away at the temp coming out of the exchanger. I can not hold my hand in front of the air for long before i have to pull away. ITs extremly hot air. I have no doubt that this stove is going to more affectively heat my space better then my wood stove. The blowers are very quite, and so far the gas is staying pretty clean. I still have not tweaked the feed rate or the combustion blower voltage. I cant see messing with something that is burning perfectly out of the box. My monometer showed weak pressure for the low setting. It was reading about .30 and the manual likes .35-.40. once again, im not going to mess with it when it seems to be working very efficiently.
Im not so sure about the gasket around the pellet hopper. If that hopper is connected to the vacuum switch then i would guess that gasket would eventually get dirty and leak air. I guess time will tell. I wish it had a maintenance free hopper system. I know that gasket is going to need replacement at some point.
Some handy tools for the top vent kit, and general installation.
ratchet set instead of nut diver to make the bolts easier to install.
power drill with a large flat bit to remove the shipping bolts.
Monometer for checking negative pressure of the unit.
mill pack to seal up some of the joints in the top vent kit collar. there where some visable gaps between the 6" flange of the kit, and the plate on the bottom that makes it like a bowl with 90* sides.
Some notes about some things i did half ass.
I did not seal any joints, they all fit very well. No smoke smell at start up, we will see how long it take for ash to accumulate.
This stove was installed on a 24' existing class A chimney that is in a insulated chase. I used the harman top vent kit with out the use of any out side air kit.
I think thats all for now. I will add more notes as they come to me.
First fire up sent the smoke alarms going nuts. It fired right up, with very minimal smoke at start up. The unit got to temp, and it burned off really well.
I am completely blown away at the temp coming out of the exchanger. I can not hold my hand in front of the air for long before i have to pull away. ITs extremly hot air. I have no doubt that this stove is going to more affectively heat my space better then my wood stove. The blowers are very quite, and so far the gas is staying pretty clean. I still have not tweaked the feed rate or the combustion blower voltage. I cant see messing with something that is burning perfectly out of the box. My monometer showed weak pressure for the low setting. It was reading about .30 and the manual likes .35-.40. once again, im not going to mess with it when it seems to be working very efficiently.
Im not so sure about the gasket around the pellet hopper. If that hopper is connected to the vacuum switch then i would guess that gasket would eventually get dirty and leak air. I guess time will tell. I wish it had a maintenance free hopper system. I know that gasket is going to need replacement at some point.
Some handy tools for the top vent kit, and general installation.
ratchet set instead of nut diver to make the bolts easier to install.
power drill with a large flat bit to remove the shipping bolts.
Monometer for checking negative pressure of the unit.
mill pack to seal up some of the joints in the top vent kit collar. there where some visable gaps between the 6" flange of the kit, and the plate on the bottom that makes it like a bowl with 90* sides.
Some notes about some things i did half ass.
I did not seal any joints, they all fit very well. No smoke smell at start up, we will see how long it take for ash to accumulate.
This stove was installed on a 24' existing class A chimney that is in a insulated chase. I used the harman top vent kit with out the use of any out side air kit.
I think thats all for now. I will add more notes as they come to me.
